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54551. The Spectre of Territorial Division and the Ohrid Agreement

Author:
Eben Friedman
Publication Date:
06-2003
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
European Centre for Minority Issues (ECMI)
Abstract:
Should stalling win out over implementation of the Framework Agreement, support within the ethnic Albanian population for radical groups outside of politics could increase, and recent converts to the political process might be propelled back into the realm of violent action.12 If non-implementation risks provoking violence on the part of segments of the ethnic Albanian population, however, so is inexpert implementation of the Framework Agreement likely to encourage violence on the part of radical ethnic Macedonian groups anxious to capitalize on popular discontent associated not only with the terms of the Framework Agreement, but also with the country’s dire economic situation. Moreover, both of these scenarios are likely to increase support for proposals to partition Macedonia, the liabilities of which have been discussed above. Thus, given the alternatives, it is crucial that the provisions of the Framework Agreement be implemented competently and in a timely manner.
Topic:
Minorities, Ethnicity, Conflict, Borders, and Diversity
Political Geography:
Europe and Macedonia

54552. Understanding the Bush Doctrine

Author:
Robert Jervis
Publication Date:
09-2003
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
ROBERT JERVIS argues that the Bush doctrine presents a highly ambitious conception of U.S. foreign policy. Based on the premise that this is a period of great threat and great opportunity, the doctrine calls for the assertion and expansion of American power in service of hegemony. He concludes that this assertion and expansion is not likely to succeed.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Hegemony, Iraq War, and George W. Bush
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

54553. Shoring up the Right to Vote for President: A Modest Proposal [with Panel Discussion]

Author:
Alexander Keyssar
Publication Date:
07-2003
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
ALEXANDER KEYSSAR argues that the 2000 presidential election has made clear the desirability of a constitutional amendment guaranteeing to all American citizens the right to vote for president and to have those votes determine each state’s vote in the electoral college. Tracing certain features of the history of suffrage in the United States, he maintains that such an amendment would make the Constitution consistent with the now broadly based consensus (not present at the nation’s founding) that voting is a right that inheres in all citizens. THE PANELISTS (D. Caraley, L. Greenhouse, S. Issacharoff, R. Pildes, G. Pomper, J. Rakove, R. Shapiro, R. Smith) discuss the points raised by the Keyssar article. They end up with consensus on the need for a constitutional right to vote for president, but have some differences on additional aspects of reforming the system.
Topic:
Constitution, Domestic Politics, Voting Rights, Presidential Elections, and Electoral College
Political Geography:
United States of America

54554. Terror, Terrain, and Turnout: Explaining the 2002 Midterm Elections

Author:
Gary C. Jacobson
Publication Date:
03-2003
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
GARY C. JACOBSON argues that the results of the 2002 congressional election were consistent with past midterm elections as referenda on the administration and the economy, although the terrorist attacks of September 11 profoundly affected the referendum's substance. The modest Republican victory was a consequence of the post- September 11 rally in support for President George W. Bush, redistricting (in the House), and higher turnout among Republican loyalists. There was no evidence of any national shift in public sentiment toward the Republican party.
Topic:
Elections, Domestic Politics, 9/11, Political Parties, and George W. Bush
Political Geography:
United States of America

54555. Limits of American Power

Author:
Joseph S. Nye Jr.
Publication Date:
01-2003
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Political Science Quarterly
Institution:
Academy of Political Science
Abstract:
JOSEPH S. NYE, JR. discusses the paradox of the United States having unparalleled military power, yet being unable to impose its will unilaterally on either its allies or its antagonists. He explains clearly why America must adopt a more cooperative engagement with the rest of the world.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Military Affairs, and Engagement
Political Geography:
North America and United States of America

54556. Full Issue

Author:
Bertrade Ngo Ngijol-Banoum, Mojúbàolú Olúfúnké, Jàre Àjàyí, Débò Kòtún, and Mojúbàolú Olufúnké Okome
Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Ìrìnkèrindò: A Journal of African Migration
Institution:
Ìrìnkèrindò: a Journal of African Migration
Abstract:
CONTENTS Editorial Ìrìnkèrindò: An Idea Whose Time Has Come — Mojúbàolú Olúfúnké Okome and Bertrade Ngo Ngijol-Banoum ................................................................................................................... 1 Articles Crossroads — Jàre Àjàyí ............................................................................................................. 23 Welcome Back Homeless — Débò Kòtún ................................................................................... 25 The Antinomies of Globalization: Causes of Contemporary African Immigration to the United States of America. — Mojúbàolú Olúfúnké Okome ........................................................ 29 Going to America: Excerpt from a Novel titled: So That the Path Does Not Die. — A. Onipede Hollist................................................................................................................................ 63 Cry My Beloved Ugborodo (Escravos?) — Oritsegbemi O. Omatete ....................................... . 70 Searching for Fortune: The Geographical Process of Nigerian Migration to Dublin, Ireland — Julius Kómoláfé ............................................................................................................... 86 Nigerian Physical Therapists' Job Satisfaction: A Nigeria U.S.A. Comparison — Adetoyeje Y. Oyeyemi ......................................................................................................................... 103 TUTÙOLÁ 'RESURFACES' IN ITALY: An Exegesis of Alessandra di Maio's recent book on Amos Tutùolá — Jàre Àjàyí ......................................................................................... 122 Abiku: An Excerpt from the Novel — Débò Kòtún .................................................................. 127 (In)Visibility and Duality of the Civil Rights and Yoruba Movements: 1950s-1990s — Faola Ifagboyede ...................................................................................................................... 142
Topic:
Globalization, Migration, Culture, and Civil Rights
Political Geography:
Africa

54557. Political Institutions and Economic Policies: Lessons from Africa

Author:
Macartan Humphreys and Robert Bates
Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Scholars, activists, and policy makers have argued that the route to economic growth in Africa runs through political reform. In particular, they prescribe electoral accountability as a step toward economic reform, seeing it as inducing the choice of publicly beneficial as opposed to privately profitable economic policies. To assess the validity of such arguments, we first characterize a set of political institutions that render political elites accountable and derive their expected impact on the policy choices of governments. Using ratings of macro-economic policy produced by the World Bank and ratings of corrupt practices produced for private investors, we explore the relationship between institutional forms and policy choices on both an African and global sample. While key elements of the model find empirical support, the central argument receives mixed support in the data. Political institutions have a stronger influence on policy making in Africa than elsewhere and variation in African institutions and in the structure of African economies account for differences between policy choices in Africa and those made in the rest of the world. Political accountability however does not influence the choice of macro-economic policies in the manner suggested by reformist arguments; although it does appear to lead to less political predation.
Topic:
Economics, Politics, Reform, Elections, Economic Growth, and Macroeconomics
Political Geography:
Africa

54558. The Contested Governance of GM Foods: Implications for U.S.-EU Trade and the Developing World

Author:
Robert L. Paarlberg
Publication Date:
07-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
Genetically modified (GM) foods are widely produced in the United States and in two other Western Hemisphere countries (Argentina and Canada) but almost nowhere else. In most other wealthy industrial countries, including Europe and Japan, it is legal for farmers to plant these crops, but they voluntarily refrain from doing so because consumers are averse to eating GM. In most developing countries it is not yet legal for farmers to grow GM foods, on biological safety grounds. Yet biosafety is not the real issue. Poor countries are now trying to stay “GM-free” so as to retain the option of exporting food to Europe and Japan. New regulations in the EU on the labeling and traceability of imported GM foods and feeds will only increase the potential cost to exporters of planting GM seeds. The United States has considered challenging EU regulations as illegal under the WTO, and a serious trade conflict now looms. The EU, not the United States, is better positioned to prevail in this conflict. In international food markets, safety and labeling standards tend to be set by big importers rather than big exporters.
Topic:
Agriculture, Markets, Food, European Union, Farming, and Genetic Modification (GM)
Political Geography:
Canada, Argentina, United States of America, and North America

54559. The Ignored Transition: Post-Communist State Development

Author:
Anna Grzymala-Busse and Pauline Jones Luong
Publication Date:
03-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
This study reconceptualizes theories of the state in light of post–communist developments. After the collapse of communist regimes across Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, scholars overlooked a central aspect of the transition: the need to reconstruct public authority, or state–building. Likewise, theorists of the state have largely ignored the post–communist challenge to existing theories of state capacity and development. Post–communist state development is characterized by the need to reconstruct public authority, or state–building. Two aspects of this process determine subsequent state trajectories: a) the representativeness of elite competition (that is, whether elites compete by representing constituencies, or in self-contained elite conflicts), and b) the mechanisms of elite competition (that is, whether it is channeled via formal institutions, or informal networks and ties.)
Topic:
Development, State, State Building, Competition, and Post-Communism
Political Geography:
Eastern Europe and Soviet Union

54560. A Proposal to Anchor Monetary Policy by the Price of the Export Commodity

Author:
Jeffrey Frankel and Ayako Saiki
Publication Date:
09-2002
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University
Abstract:
The debate over monetary standards and exchange rate regimes for developing countries is as wide open as ever. On the one hand, the big selling points of floating exchange rates – monetary independence and accommodation of terms of trade shocks – have not lived up to their promise. On the other hand, proposals for credible institutional monetary commitments to nominal anchors have each run aground on their own peculiar shoals. Rigid pegs to the dollar, for example, are dangerous when the dollar appreciates relative to other export markets. This study explores a new proposal: that countries specialized in the export of a particular commodity should peg their currency to that commodity. When the dollar price of the commodity on world markets falls, the dollar exchange rate of the local currency would fall in tandem. The country would thus reap the best of both worlds: the advantage of a nominal anchor for monetary policy, together with the automatic accommodation to terms of trade shocks that floating rates claim to deliver. The paper conducts a set of counterfactual experiments. For each of a list of countries specialized in particular mineral or agricultural commodities, what would have happened, over the last 30 years, if it had pegged its currency to that commodity, as compared to pegging to the dollar, yen, or mark, or as compared to whatever exchange rate policy it actually followed historically? We compute under these scenarios the price of the commodity in local terms, and we then simulate the implications for exports. Illustrative of the results is that some victims of financial difficulties in the late 1990s might have achieved a stimulus to exports precisely when it was most needed, without having to go through wrenching currency collapses, if they had been on regimes of pegging to their export commodity: South Africa to gold or platinum, Nigeria and Indonesia to oil, Chile to copper, Argentina to wheat, Colombia to coffee, and so on. Not all countries will benefit from a peg to their export commodity, and none will benefit in all time periods. Nonetheless, the results suggest that the proposal that some countries peg their currency to their principle export commodity deserves to take its place alongside pegs to major currencies and the other monetary regimes that countries consider.
Topic:
Monetary Policy, Commodities, Exports, Economic Development, and Exchange Rates
Political Geography:
Global Focus